Gerald Maurice Ronson,

CBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(born 27 May 1939) is a British business tycoon and philanthropist. He became known in the UK as one of the 'Guinness Four' for his part in the

Guinness share-trading fraud The Guinness share-trading fraud was a major business scandal of the 1980s. It involved the manipulation of the London stock market to inflate the price of Guinness shares to thereby assist Guinness's £4 billion takeover bid for the Scottish dr ...

of the

1980s File:1980s replacement montage02.PNG, 420px, From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, ''Columbia'', lifts off in 1981; US president Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev ease tensions between the two superpowers, leading to the ...

as a result of which he was convicted and imprisoned.

Early life and career

Ronson was born into a middle-class

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

family. He left school aged 15 to join his father in the family furniture business, named

Heron The herons are long-legged, long-necked, freshwater and coastal birds in the family Ardeidae, with 72 recognised species, some of which are referred to as egrets or bitterns rather than herons. Members of the genera ''Botaurus'' and ''Ixobrychus ...

after his father Henry. The company expanded into

property Property is a system of rights that gives people legal control of valuable things, and also refers to the valuable things themselves. Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property may have the right to consume, alter, share, r ...

development, at first with small residential projects, later with commercial and office properties too. By 1967 the company was active in seven European countries and fifty-two British municipalities. In the mid-1960s Ronson brought the first self-service petrol retail outlets to the United Kingdom.

Heron International

By the early 1980s Heron was one of the largest private companies in the United Kingdom, with assets of over £1.5 billion. By the 1990s, it almost collapsed with debts of over £1 billion owed to 11,000 bondholders. The company survived with loans from

Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is a co-founder of Microsoft, along with his late childhood friend Paul Allen. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions ...

Rupert Murdoch Keith Rupert Murdoch ( ; born 11 March 1931) is an Australian-born American business magnate. Through his company News Corp, he is the owner of hundreds of local, national, and international publishing outlets around the world, including ...

Craig McCaw Craig McCaw (born August 11, 1949) is an American businessman and entrepreneur, a pioneer in the cellular phone industry. He is the founder of McCaw Cellular (now part of AT&T Mobility) and Clearwire Corporation (now part of T-Mobile via the Sprin ...

Oracle Corporation Oracle Corporation is an American multinational computer technology corporation headquartered in Austin, Texas. In 2020, Oracle was the third-largest software company in the world by revenue and market capitalization. The company sells da ...

's founder,

Larry Ellison Lawrence Joseph Ellison (born August 17, 1944) is an American business magnate and investor who is the co-founder, executive chairman, chief technology officer (CTO) and former chief executive officer (CEO) of the American computer technology ...

, and others, and went on to develop projects including

Heron Tower Salesforce Tower, 110 Bishopsgate (formerly Heron Tower) is a commercial skyscraper in London. It stands tall including its mast making it the second tallest building in the City of London financial district and the fifth List of tallest buil ...

and

The Heron ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

in the City of London and The Peak in London's Victoria. Heron Tower, Bishopsgate, London

Ronson's more recent additional business ventures include Ronson Capital Partners, an investment firm he established to invest opportunistically in real estate assets in the UK; and Rontec Investments, a consortium comprising Snax 24, Investec and Grovepoint Capital, created to acquire the assets of Total Oil UK. By 1989, he was listed by ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

'' as having a net worth of £500 million. The Ronson family suffered from the 1990s commercial property crash: "The Ronson family lost $1 billion of its own money in the property crash of the early 1990s," Gerald Ronson says. "The important thing was to rebuild."

Criminal conviction and the "Guinness Four"

Ronson became notorious in the UK as one of the

Guinness Four The Guinness share-trading fraud was a major business scandal of the 1980s. It involved the manipulation of the London stock market to inflate the price of Guinness shares to thereby assist Guinness's £4 billion takeover bid for the Scottish dri ...

for his involvement in the

of the 1980s. He was convicted in August 1990 of one charge of conspiracy, two of false accounting, and one of

theft Theft is the act of taking another person's property or services without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it. The word ''theft'' is also used as a synonym or informal shorthand term for some ...

. He was fined £5 million and given a one-year jail sentence, of which he served six months. In 2000 the

European Court of Human Rights The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR or ECtHR), also known as the Strasbourg Court, is an international court of the Council of Europe which interprets the European Convention on Human Rights. The court hears applications alleging that a ...

ruled that use of statements made to inspectors in the 1990 trial had been unfair, but rejected five other complaints and denied a costs application. An appeal to the

Court of Appeal A court of appeals, also called a court of appeal, appellate court, appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear an appeal of a trial court or other lower tribunal. In much of t ...

Criminal Division, seeking to have the

Human Rights Act 1998 The Human Rights Act 1998 (c. 42) is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom which received royal assent on 9 November 1998, and came into force on 2 October 2000. Its aim was to incorporate into UK law the rights contained in the European Con ...

applied retrospectively, failed in 2001. A final appeal to the House of Lords failed in 2002. No further appeal was possible and the convictions were upheld.

Philanthropy

Gerald Ronson is a long-time supporter of Jewish and other charitable causes. He is the Founding Chairman of the Jewish

Community Security Trust The Community Security Trust (CST) is a British charity whose purpose is to provide safety, security, and advice to the Jewish community in the UK. It provides advice, training, representation and research. Founding and mission The Community Sec ...

, Vice-president of the

NSPCC The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) is a British child protection charity. History Victorian era On a trip to New York in 1881, Liverpudlian businessman Thomas Agnew was inspired by a visit to the New Yor ...

and President of JCoSS. Ronson has won City AM's Personality of the Year Award in September 2011 and other awards. In 2009,

Juan Carlos I of Spain Juan Carlos I (;, * ca, Joan Carles I, * gl, Xoán Carlos I, Juan Carlos Alfonso Víctor María de Borbón y Borbón-Dos Sicilias, born 5 January 1938) is a member of the Spanish royal family who reigned as King of Spain from 22 Nov ...

bestowed Gerald Ronson with the Encomienda de Numero of the Spanish Order of Civil Merit Decoration. In the same year, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Civil Law from Northumbria University. Ronson was appointed

Commander of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(CBE) in the 2012 New Year Honours for charitable services, notwithstanding his criminal past, convictions, fines and imprisonment.

Personal life

Ronson is married to philanthropist and socialite Dame

Gail Ronson Dame Gail Ronson, DBE (born 3 July 1946) is a British charity fundraiser and the wife of businessman Gerald Ronson whom she married when she was 21 years old; she has four children - Lisa, Amanda, Nicole, and Hayley - and nine grandchildren. She ...

. They have four daughters: Lisa, Amanda, Nicole and Hayley. He is the uncle of record producer

Mark Ronson Mark Daniel Ronson (born 4 September 1975) is a British-American DJ, songwriter, record producer, and record executive. He is best known for his collaborations with artists such as Duran Duran, Amy Winehouse, Adele, Lady Gaga, Lily Allen, Robbi ...

. When asked about his family and Jewish heritage in an interview with the ''

Jewish Telegraph The ''Jewish Telegraph'' is a British Jewish newspaper. It was founded in December 1950 by Frank and Vivienne Harris, the parents of the current editor, Paul Harris. Founding Frank and Vivienne Harris founded the newspaper in their dining ro ...

'', Ronson responded: "I am a proud

Jew Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...

..when I go back to when I was a young boy, nothing has changed and that's how I look at the Ronson family, involved in school building, whether it be

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, the

Jewish Leadership Council The Jewish Leadership Council (previously known as the Jewish Community Leadership Council) is an organisation in the United Kingdom, founded in 2003, whose declared aim is to forward the interests of the organised Jewish community in Britain. ...

Jewish Care Jewish Care is a British charity, working mainly in London and South East England, providing health and social care support services for the Jewish community. The charity runs over 70 centres and services which include care homes, community centr ...

or most of the major organisations I've been involved in". He wants his four daughters, nine grandchildren and eventual great-grandchildren to "understand who they are, what they are, what their background is and what their responsibility is. I've given them the tools to be able to continue doing those things in their life which I believe will make them good people".

References

External links

New Years Honours List 2012

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadca ...

, 31 December 2011.
"Guinness Four fail in fight for acquittal"

, 21 December 2001.
"Life and high-flying times of four partners in crime"
''

The Scotsman ''The Scotsman'' is a Scottish compact newspaper and daily news website headquartered in Edinburgh. First established as a radical political paper in 1817, it began daily publication in 1855 and remained a broadsheet until August 2004. Its par ...

'', 22 December 2001.
Gerald Ronson profile in the UK business magazine ''Leisure Management''

"A Guy Named Gerald," interview with Gerald Ronson, ''Building.co.uk
', 2007. {{DEFAULTSORT:Ronson, Gerald 1939 births Living people People from Paddington British Ashkenazi Jews English Jews Businesspeople from London 20th-century British businesspeople 21st-century British businesspeople English philanthropists Jewish British philanthropists Commanders of the Order of the British Empire

Gerald Ronson Gerald Maurice Ronson, CBE (born 27 May 1939) is a British business tycoon and philanthropist. He became known in the UK as one of the 'Guinness Four' for his part in the Guinness share-trading fraud of the 1980s as a result of which he was conv ...